As part of The Huffington Post’s ‘Building Modern Men campaign’, CALM have revealed that men struggling with depression are less likely to discuss their problems with friends and more likely to exhibit risk-taking behaviour.

CALM’s masculinity audit also detailed how only half of men who feel ‘very depressed’ ever tell their friends about it compared to 67 per cent of women.

Their data showed that over 4,500 men kill themselves every year in the UK with suicide remaining the single biggest killer of British males under the age of 45.

The figures also showed that while half of all male respondents had felt very depressed at some time the figure rose to two thirds amongst men aged between 25 to 34 .

According to the Huff Post’s study men are three times more likely than women to commit suicide and experts believe this boils down to men lacking the ‘language’ to talk about mental health.

Professor Damien Ridge from the University of Westminster, told Huff Post UK:

[Society] thinks men are doing pretty well ok compared to women. Actually, this shows that when men talk about depression on their own terms, quite a large proportion are not doing so well.

We think of mental health as being in a minority. What this is saying is, actually, most of us, from time to time, have mental health problems.

He went on to add that men are less likely to be diagnosed with common mental health disorders than women and that GPs are not always able to pick up on the way men talk about their distress.

According to the professor, women have a whole history of talking about stuff with their girlfriends, family and so on. They open up and talk. There’s a language to talk about their distress which men just don’t have.

Finally the audit found men feel more pressure to be a provider for their families with 31 per cent of men surveyed saying this compared to 19 per cent of women.

If you’ve been struggling with any of the issues discussed in this story call CALM on 0800 58 58 58 or if you’re in London 0808 802 58 585.